Subaru Legacy Concept

The Legacy gets ripped for its 20th birthday.

Subaru may be pulling out of the World Rally Championship, but the Japanese company is keeping busy developing future production cars, as this Legacy Concept from the Detroit show proves.

Do you like what you see? We do. This racier-looking Legacy remains a 4-door sports sedan, an all-wheel-driver powered by a 3.6-liter flat-6 boxer engine that provides the car with a distinctive growl while helping to lower the center of gravity for improved handling.

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The exterior of the Legacy Concept has a theme that Subaru calls "Presence." To that end, the Legacy Concept has a strong front design dominated by a grille with Subaru's wing motif. Around the side, dramatic wheel arches highlight the dynamism of the car's all-wheel-drive system, while design lines that flow from the hood to the roof and trunk accentuate the increased mass of the car. In addition to larger door openings for easier ingress/egress, the Legacy Concept also has side rear vision cameras.

Subaru chose "High Definition" as the interior theme of the 4-seat Legacy Concept. As such, this global mid-size sedan has an expansive feel with lots of leg room. Pearl White leather with a blue sheen covers the seats, with black metallic leather on the door panels providing a nice contrast. The center console captures lots of attention with its cylindrical shape, not to mention its large touch-panel display.

Subaru says this concept strongly suggests the styling direction of the 2010 Legacy, which will continue to be built at Subaru plants in Gunman, Japan, and in Lafayette, Indiana. For the record, some 3.6 million Legacy models have been built since 1989, the year of its inception, and the U.S. accounts for 43 percent of the production volume.

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